Ashkecker's page

Are the Black Dragons available still or not?
If I add a case + dragon to my shopping cart as guest, it lets me but then it pulls it when I log in. If I'm already logged in, the add button is gone.

In 3.5, there were two places with info about swarms. One was in the subtype section, and the Bestiary has copied this more or less verbatim.

The other place was in the entry called Swarms, where all the swarms were plopped together. The bestiary puts the swarms in alpha order, so there is no similar section.

Most of what was in the second spot was a repeat of the first, however this section is not. As a result, these rules have been evicted from the Pathfinder game. I'm assuming by oversight instead design.

Vulnerabilities Of Swarms

Swarms are extremely difficult to fight with physical attacks. However, they have a few special vulnerabilities, as follows:

A lit torch swung as an improvised weapon deals 1d3 points of fire damage per hit.

A weapon with a special ability such as flaming or frost deals its full energy damage with each hit, even if the weapon’s normal damage can’t affect the swarm.

A lit lantern can be used as a thrown weapon, dealing 1d4 points of fire damage to all creatures in squares adjacent to where it breaks.

Without reinstating these rules, my group would have been killed by bats. Very embarrassing.

So which was it, oversight or design?

Pax asked me put up the notes from when I converted this to 3.5. You should be able to use PF rules with minimal trouble too.

If you've got comments - put them in the original thread to keep this uncluttered.
http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/community/gaming/dnd/helpWithOldAdvent ureUK4WhenAStarFalls&page=1

Some of the changes I made were for my homebrew universe, so I might mention Eo. Also, in a fit of undue paranoia, I changed all the names of characters because I found several journals of the adventure from searching Piyarz, etc.

Shalfrey = Freyu
Piyarz = Podnio
if I refer to them instead, feel free to call me on it.

When a Star Falls - An adventure for 6 Level 3 characters.
If you do not have the original adventure by Graeme Morris, then buy that (I was lucky, I got a PDF copy when Paizo was still selling), rejoice in the awesome, then come back.

Death on the Moors (EL 5)

I changed this the most. I didn't like how the Memory Web was just a "plot device pinata" that you beat on until it spills out memories everywhere. So keeping the same general theme, I invented Brain Spiders (I don't play psionics, so I didn't know about the spell.)

You can begin this adventure during any travelling, make it seem like a random encounter.

4 Brain Spiders
Brain Spiders are giant brains with a large set of eyes, 8 hairy legs and chelicerae. Use Medium Monstrous Spiders for stats, but increase CR by 1 and give them this ability.

Spit Memory (Su)
These spiders consume memories by eating the brains of their victims. Intense memories are too difficult to digest, so the spiders store them and attack their next victims with them.
The target must make DC 12 Will save or be stunned for 1 round as they experience the memory. Even if they save, they still experience the memory but remain aware. I used dazed for this state (see why below) but if that's too harsh replace with something else or with no effect.
Consult Monk Memories for what to do for each attack.

The PCs will notice evidence of a fight on the road they are following, and signs that things have been dragged off into the nearby copse of trees. If they follow, they will encounter a web (DC 20 Spot to avoid walking into it - see spider rules) and the spiders will attack.

After the fight, the PCs will find another dead spider, and the bodies of 4 men in white robes.

(Well, black in my game. I thought the white/black thing was a little too corny. Other reasons too, see much later.) They have only sparse possessions and are obviously monks. The only thing of value is a Bestiary. (They got an early copy! But I have it on pre-order too, WTF!)

But I made my save!
Presumably, the monks of Shalfrey are more awesome then the ones who protect the other sages. (See much later in the adventure.) Which means they are higher level than the PCs, so how did they fall victim to the spiders? Well, they killed one, so there were 5 but still...
That is why a successful save still gets dazed, since there were 4 monks and 5 spiders, the monks were in trouble. If it seems like this ability to way to powerful, keep in mind that the spiders need ammo. Without a recent kill, they are just weird looking spiders.

Monk Memories
Here's how I did the memories.

1) Spice up each memory so it is more than just a broken phrase. Fair use demands that I give one as an example, you'll have to do the rest yourself. You have a copy of the AD&D module, right? No? Why are you still reading?

You are in a sunlit room with a dome of glass hexagons. You know somehow that this is the tower of a place called the Citadel. An old man with a snowy white beard and dark robes is here, he is your master Freyu. Your brother Orm says, "And if we are delayed, master?" Freyu looks carefully at us, then says, "If you must, send word with someone you trust. Tell them: The fair sun shines brightly, but the stars have secrets, lost in the day, that only the night can reveal.

(OK. Lots of my homebrew changes in that one.)

2) Print them on index cards, or print them and tape them to index cards, if you are as bad as I am at trying to get print on cards.

3) Group them into 3 categories: Important (these are the bold ones in the module, the game is broken without them!) Moderate (ones that help with the game, like the lost in the maze one) and Unnecessary (ones with just some flavor to them.)

4) Increase your stack by printing lots of duplicates of the important ones, and a few of the moderates. Put all the important ones and some moderates in the stack, leave the rest to replenish your stack.

5) When a PC is attacked with a memory, fan out the stack and have him pick one. Then weed out the duplicates of that one, and add some of the less important ones.

6) When the fight was over, I had one unnecessary memory left. If the characters are having too easy a time, and you've still got a lot of memories, maybe you need to have an extra spider emerge from the shadows. If you end up with important memories left, you might have to have the monks wrapped in a web and do the smashing the web releases memories trick. If you run out of memories, there's no problem, that just means the spiders are out of ammo.

The PC who get the "make haste to Derwyth's home" memory or others that deal with travel can recall the map that the master laid out for them. It should tell where the druid lives, and where the pass and the tower are.

Random Encounters

I just used these as given. If you don't have a source for a certain monster, roll again or substitute something appropriate.

1-2 Griffons EL 4-6
1-4 Mountain Lions (use Leopard) EL 2-5
4-6 Giant Sheep (use Riding Horse) EL 5
1-3 Ogres (tough enough without the dogs) EL 3-5
1-2 Brown Bears (note that 2-5 would be EL 6+!) EL 4-6
2-4 Bugbears (again, watch the EL) EL 4-6
5-10 Wolves (ditto) EL 5-6
2 trolls (make sure you have them arguing since surprise will be helpful) EL 7
I also made the bag with the giant sheep a Bag of Holding (Type 1) since it would suck to get no treasure for a tough encounter.

The title is literal, not lyrical, in this case.

A certain PF publication talks about harming an incorporeal creature (a shadow in this case) with fire from a torch or lit oil. Is there any evidence in the PF (or heck even 3.5) rules that this is possible?

Apologies if this appears twice. It seems to have gotten eaten.

It seems that dropping Concentration as a skill has also caused it to disappear from the stat block. It is still pretty important and to figure it out for yourself you need to check feats, abilities, etc. So it seems like it ought to be in the standard stat blocks.

I recommend right next to caster level.
Spells Prepared: (CL 10 ; Concentration + 20)

It seems that dropping Concentration as a skill has also caused it to disappear from the stat block. It is still pretty important and to figure it out for yourself you need to check feats, abilities, etc. So it seems like it ought to be in the standard stat blocks.

I recommend right next to caster level.
Spells Prepared: (CL 10 ; Concentration + 20)

I was intrigued to learn that some people play D&D analog. As stated here I was curious about analog gaming.

Instead of dice, which give discrete results, what do you use? Graduated cylinders filled with a random amount of water? A box of sticks of varying length? Or do you just roll a lot of d10s to approximate analog values?

Do you do anything special if a player rolls pi? Is that like a crit or something?

You must think the diagonal 1-1-1-1 vs 1-2-1-2 debate is so silly, since I guess you use sqrt2-2sqrt2-3sqrt2-4sqrt2?

Thank you for your time. I'll let you get back to your oscilloscopes.

Is the gazetteer not ready for shipment?

I've got it sitting in my sidecart, but I just got a mail saying I'm getting Old Korvosa by itself.

I just subscribed to Chronicles on Saturday, and the order system did seem a little confused while I was doing it. I tried to switch me Immediate Shipments and I had to switch it back.

Thanks.

It seems like the obvious way to slow character advancement is to give less XP. Doing it by a slow/medium/fast XP table seems to create a problem if you need to convert because you've (a) decided it's too slow/fast (b) got a rotating GM who wants to do it differently etc.
Also, if the primary purpose of the Pathfinder RPG is to play Pathfinder Adventure Paths, it seems counter productive to strongly feature alternate systems of advancement that won't advance characters at the rate the adventures expect. I suppose you can have gaps between the adventures, but many assume leveling going on during the adventure, leading to (more than expected) TPKs during the climatic battles.